And the treasures of the world. And one of the largest deposits of stuff is right here in the baltic sea. So we are in the clinic, rod region, trying to learn all the we can about this multi called the was to meet cool is a geologist and painting intelligence. Amber is important to his work and hes the perfect person to give us some perspective. The 3rd one is to you. Um i see sounds of amber. Lets get right to it. So i just disagree as to what exactly it is. Is it a stone . Is it a gym . Is it resin . What is amber . Exactly. The just needs to be a bird. Yes, im a good question. From a d, a logical point of view. You cant cool amber, a mineral, a mineral levine or a stone. Its an organic substance. Good, fossilized, resin, or if this got by, im a small from a chemical point of view. Its an am office frame pull about its composed of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. Its literally like most organic substances on us. They can also contain impurities, like sofa and other elements settings. That means that water is amber. Its fossilized resident that you have the fossilized resin from ancient plants was wondering if your engine griggs new with them. But i dont get a garbage in small and is origin from plants even you could you test it to when he wrote about these, these, these 2 of the baltic tribe that lived in the 1st century id said they collected fossilized residents, which contained remnants of plants so full bath was back in ancient greece, and during the 18th century, calling this and the great me, if i use them and also for almost single tediously put them into the em, but it wont get, i can nature comes from plants. You said nobody, me and the reason only found in the leningrad region is its just that theres a lot. Yeah. Ill tell you why a little later. And it can be found in many places around the world. Mostly in the northern hemisphere. Dominican number is very famous as well as them, but from them its moving his bottom i to theres also a lot of amber in the far north. You start in the polar region, so im moving to attain the dependency left on suckered in near lake bank of steven, and both right as amber in europe in 3 places. I mean, you can and around can. In grad poland, ukraines rough in the region. Good amended, gemini, saxony, loving this and the result roughly the same age. But its very important to you said that the m bus throughout the world is a difference of geological ages through stuck in some places. There is geologically young, amber and now those at smaller ancient. But many geologists may consider sucks tonight to be true and sex with different types of them, but have different names here. Thought she was, this was called sucks and i to, i knew it exists here in leningrad, enrolled now and in germany. Full arrest found in various parts of the world of gold, amber like residence. Yeah. They differ in their physical and chemical properties. Theyre less dense, less and biscuits, and really used to make jewelry. Last, whats good about all around the same sex, and i say, well, is that its actively used in jewelry making video me an interesting question is how amber foamed. And when that happens to still talk about as i will see. Mm hm. Scientists have different ways of measuring the age of um, amber. So what is the oldest known sample that we have uh, available to us. Uh, no. Can i use the 1st started cuz he said, well, of course its not as old as our planet, or as we know from the oldest rocks, this is 4500000000 years old planet was formed around 4 to 6000000 years ago. As well as the moon and the planet system. Of course, amber is very young compared to the smaller amber, like the piece in my hand is around 37000000 years old. Its its, its geologically young. But theres more ancient amber. I used for example, in burma, who am i am uh oh, its about a 100000000 years old. From the cretaceous period, houses from the patio jane period. What video does em, but gold cocoa, its very young. 30, a few 1000 years old. You can find it in japan and south east asia, and in the Southern Hemisphere you can find cocoa will stand argentina if you wouldnt mind. Its just a few 1000 years old. But how do we know the age . If we look at this deposit, what its a marine deposit from an ancient see if it was, its the same age as december. The people somewhat the so you can find a book in them, but to a lesser degree must be as long as they were formed. In a sea but not the baltic sea. Yeah. The baltics that youve geologically young. Sure. Its 10 to 12000 years old. Um. Yeah, because it was formed in iglesia lake. It was with the voltage is now. This came from a melting garcia. Its about 20000 years ago, but before that this land was dry hunter. And under these calm re in Shallow Water conditions, a sealed clay and some deposits formed what we see here, a sort of tends to 2 to 3 meters underestimate. What does a different kind of deposit . Gold, what blue a full blue ground bed watching and amber is highly concentrated, precise in this blue us and the origin is old. Amber reserves can be found in blue with us. Why is that . Why do we find amber here . On the coast because this blue s extends out about 10 meters from the sea, bottom of that with the with lips. Then well see wash it down here, and the other is lighter than water. Its light. So it ends up on the b triple that we collected. Well, yes, it most of it, right . So about the age of amber, youve talked about that, but how long does it take for the resident to actually become amber itself . If the which flows in, of course thats very complicated because these im a ring deposits and performed on land comes from trees. So there are many hypotheses about this. One of the theories is that the chalet water see here, and ive also left them the way this land. The river flowed 37000000 years ago, just it was cold enough to spend the forests growing throughout all of this area that produced this residence on the resident fell into the river. And here the same way were was its miles where it fluid and to a google and all that down. But from the river, accumulated in this marine settlement for set the basis of the chemical physical transformation of arisen into m. There is complex and its still not completely clear how because its not moving, how long it spends in the soil is blue or if it fell directly into the river. Or if it land the ground and was then washed into it. Because model number like quite tough to remember if the coco thats being dug off is very brittle, like a typical resin truck. Its not sticky with but very brittle. It just kid but sucks and it has a very Interesting Properties. But its, its very hard with a high melting point. Its almost like can be found in different colors. And so want to use that tool connected to its origin because we still dont understand what kind of tree produce them. But for example, japanese em, but was produced by the goodman s trees. But what exactly . What kind finally done snow cool for in the country. The main Scientific Research points those time for ease. Because we find pine twigs in the embassy to spend the japanese umbrella behind. Thats also a kind of forestry that still grows today. Just, its also, its not really clear, but i think with that it will eventually show us that comes up on, you know, most the book of us. What about this place itself . I know youve already mentioned that there are other places around the world where amber is available and you can find that. But its often said that here in the baltic, its the best quality, amber. Why . The baltic white here . Im talking about, well, 37000000 years ago. That was a completely different conditions. Now its cold like that, but then there was sub tropical conditions. It was quite warm will the why the continents learned about the same place as now. But with and talk like it, we had a continental drift until the ticket was connected to us strangely. There was no end to optics composed of color into so strategy. There was no ice cap on the optics and dr. Eco. And it wasnt a temperate climate here. How do we know it was warm, like a sex . And if there is the positive accumulated fossils from life forms that like teeth is coming to dont live in the baltics anymore. This deposit is gold. Is emily a crime . Does what does it mean that put on the results that have accumulated was if you search, you will find some what start to look good or no. First, find the noise to show us the history event and alber and which of the heat loving animals and the waste is in the baltic. Now lets look proctor and we didnt really have see countries or muscles, but completely different dynamos. Live here on the see mid look starts i commend you them with also little c h and you see yeah right here. Ok. So how do they get here . I mean, we know that for a paleontologist like yourself, amber is a very rich material for you to find history and to learn about our past. And what has been the coolest thing that youve been able to find. If youre just using, well actually its not only fossils we find in them, but bearing deposits was that in the amber itself, there are fossil inclusions because thats a very interesting because if the fossil loses its structure manually inclusions because of the tiniest details like inside passing through from a poly until no trickle point of view. Thats a treasure trove. Whats the truth of new knowledge about the ancient and before is that existed here 37000000 years ago . I think a lot, well, i went speak for myself, but about the ref. Finds you can come across and use it for example. So lizards have been found in both. They kind of get goes campbell spiders that live in warmer agency. Its, you know, the majority of animals we find the number of all for about the small animals that fell into origin trap. They couldnt get out and just remained to that was but its rare to find the big around them. It was because big around the most can escape from the residence that we very rarely find fleas because flees on them all of our sites and they can jump very quickly. Not so long ago had was found from a memo. Weve never come across hulu premium will, for example, in dominican amber, which is more ancient. And boy, there was a famous dinosaur, find you the hand of a small bed like dinah. So what i have to ask a lot of people have seen the movie Jurassic Park and are fascinated by the idea. In fact, when i telling people about amber, this is the 1st thing they asked me, is this something that scientists are working on to be able to extract the dna and maybe revived dinosaurs or something along those lines . The biggest thing thats a good question. This is actually, if you look at the inclusions in the book, you can see finds the titles and smartgate those work. But it turns out she defense. Its a poly merick substance. Yeah, theres a diffusion takes place of what we see is the animal itself. Its a sort of animal in print like a 3 d shadow. If the animal itself, for the region is practically no biological content. The reason the also by both nucleic acid has a quite complicated struct. A safety composes quite quickly and its over about 500 years or so. They conducted some experiments. They took residence, todays residence, they bought insects and it is very different. So thats, im trying to sequence the dna. Yeah, about 5 years went by was the window results showing that we could completely recreate dna item and that was only after 5 years and were talking millions of years. Unfortunately, ember is a poor tramp for such organic structures when it comes to dna. Also, jurassic tough may be in great and beautiful fairy tale, but unfortunately, it is just a fairy tale. What about the clarity . You have very Different Levels of color. Sometimes its a milky sometimes. If even blue is one of the rare colors, what gives amber . Its a specific color and why is there such a wide range of things as milky and whats the transparent amber . It can be light blue or a greenish color. Oh, this depends on the embers chemical composition. Lets see if there are many aspects to consider. It depends on the kinds of impurity. So was the amount of fracturing remo fracturing thats transparent when there are a few of fractures, it can be highly transparent when there are a lot of fractures, its more ro, pagan, a solution, but most highly value them. But there is milky amber because its stronger. Its the most commonly used in jewelry making. Theres also a rotten amber, which is very fragile, but thats all connected to its physical chemical properties. But the chemical formular itself is always about the same, but do not cover a fidget see one for each 16. 00 or 2 full. But that could be an inclusion of different elements. Just let me know if through junior, cuz its really meant for me. What about the physical characteristics . I mean member can float. Its not particularly dense. It actually burns, if you try and set it on fire, it can melts. Uh, what are some of the other characteristics of amber and why is it this way . Oh, that isnt the what you know the source machine city. Well, um, but has a lot of Interesting Properties in the summer and probably the most interesting. It is its newman essence. If we want to come here with nights with an ultra violet light and turn it on and wed see how it glows in different colors, new key green. Those are transparent, luminous, light blue. Thats also caused by that old genic lattice that reacts to the ultra violet light. So she had what i have to ask. Im fascinated by her tattoos. I know that you love what you do and it shows in our conversation. But your tattoos, are they amber related as well . Or are these just random creatures that youve adorned yourself with . No, no, this is the fun question. Um yes, im parental. Im a probably on told logistics as i conduct research in various areas. Not only these em but bearing deposit seconds. My ph. D dissertation was im trying to but extinct marine offer pucks witness now to become a full professor. Im working on a paper thats also one ancient golfer pods, immune system, oregon. So these are the kinds of species ive written about. Okay, so, uh, yeah, so thats my style. I guess the, the, the near at the amber museum in cleaning drugs. They have one of the Worlds Largest collections of the precious stones. You know, keep on those is the next submission curator here. And i bet sheets has some stories to tell the email. Thanks for taking the time to meet us here. Um this is such a beautiful collection. I wanna ask, what has amber meant to teacher managing throughout the years . To finish ordering by chicago across them. Theres a lot to take in here because amber has great significance for me just because we dont know exactly why it was considered magical, 4000 years ago. And thats what it seems that was magical. Is that where were at the beginning of the 80 period. The amber trade was booming. It was connected with the romans, who considered amber to be a magical stone because of a greek legend. The amber trade greatly affected the Economic Life of europe during that period, even though it started here. When the i asked he lived on this land is the later amber became one of the most important materials traded between the hands, sciatic league, and the teutonic order. It is then a diplomatic gift, a gemstone, and the medicine for half before majority of diseases. Since now it makes fantastic jewelry. And in principle, we can find amber throughout human history. Soon. Sure is chris put it. So here i know that there are a lot of legends surrounding amber. Uh, what is your favorite . Probably my favorite one describes the attitude of people in ancient rome towards amber, which has had an influence on many of us. Its the story of a paste on your phone who suspected that he was the son of helio, the sun. God shall see us to drive his fathers chariot with its fiery horses, but couldnt cope with and was killed if the sub list. And now according to the legend, amber is present. Ready and also the tears of the daughters of the sun, god showing it. So this shows the attitude of the romans towards amber. Its the stone that lights away in the after life. Well, theres a legend that started various violins were even coated with a powder of amber. What other uses are there for this stone . Youve always for this fortune noise. Its been used for many different things, cassandra, or anything from diplomatic gift, this to amber lenses. You for measuring the density of beer and at some point it was discovered the amber improve circulation interstate and can be used for blood transfusions. Grove, in the 17th century, or even earlier, many medicines contained amber is when it was actually thought the amber was a cure for the plane. Although that may have been a legend started by amber catchers who spent a lot of time in water. So they had better hygiene at the well, none the less, the spell doctors treating in the plague, to amber wisdom and put it in the beach masks, was it was thought the amber or a unicorn horn, which was actually ivory and couldnt detect to poison and food or drinks to ship those things werent quite readily available, but they still thought it had these power 6 it there was a belief, the amber powder or oils were very useful for treating diseases to me, able to find out which disease is exactly why youd have to collect prescriptions from all over europe. For example, theres one prescription from the pope from the 13th century. This piece of property is cool thing, not split. The so how does amber make its way from the mines in its natural state to jewelry and museum showcases, were able to get access to december coming up to a unique entity which handles the whole process. The like thank you very much for taking the time to bring us out here and see how this all goes down. So i have to ask, this deposit is about 50000000 years old. My understanding is to get something that old you have to go really, really deep. Uh, maybe even down to the core or does the amber just kind of find its way up to the surface . Talk to me about that process. So theres some love you have enough. Yes. A very valid question. Im. Were now located at the side of the biggest amber deposit on the planet to get to the layers with amber bearing clay. We have to remove 50 to 60 meters, so waste, or you know, thats what most of our people work on. So we do 10 times more work removing ways to get to the blue earth. If the side has been in operation since the 1970 a month where it says theyve extracted 10000 tons of amber here, and theres got to be 100000 left voltage to so you and i surely wont live to see you over move. Can you read them thoughts . So talk to me about the whole process. So you dig, you find you process it, talk to me, how do you find amber . I know the measurements that will still do well. Any Mining Operation begins with geological exploration. I think you will, geologist, search for the amber. They can bore whole new tests and determine the con tours of the deposit and its volume. But ive given you after that would bring into miners, so you will already know approximately what depth will will find average deposits, how much there will be. And we can already make some preliminary calculations and look at the economy shortly as far as the equipment is concerned. So form of 50 meters using various ill shoot you, my employer move the 1st 25 meters with small excavators and trucks, which take all the waste or is from the develop space and the pay of them. I mean, we remove the lower layers where you can find water that henders Vehicle Movement off with drag line excavators. You can see over there about that arent affected by water adult. Wasting my arms, one buck had low can remove about 20 tons of the waist or see if its, you know, thats what its doing now is. And when this excavator finishes its work, i will finally reach the top of the blue earth with a 5 meter deep layer of blue earth, which contains the amber. Hopefully she will, we need to lift this layer with the help of the excavator. And so keep with the powerful stream of sea water. So after that, the slurry made up a scan of a clay and sea water, as well as the amber itself, goes to our Processing Plant out of our separation and sorting stuff. Them very cool. Now when i think of amber, i think of small pieces with inclusions in them. What is the biggest piece of amber . Are the most exciting thing that you found here . For a ya, its michelle, and ive got an esl note. I wont say about this. I but in general, 0 has been established that a piece of amber weighing 12 kilograms was found in the baltic coast in the 19th century. Its or thats a very rare example on bill, and i would say probably wasnt of the best quality because the bigger is a piece of amber. The more likely it is to have floss expecting that this far this side is concerned. Like a few years ago, we found a piece waiting more than 3 kilograms, so youll feel like its now in the sites. Amber museum, where anyone who wants to see can boys alive. She with a variety of shapes and large color palette. Amber has always been an inspiring medium for many artists. Piano. The pumpkin has family, has been looking at giving amber, a new perspective. Well, also preserving centuries of tradition, the piano, its always interesting to come into an Artist Workshop to see where everything happens. So thank you for the opportunity. I know that amber is quite fragile to work with. Is this an asset or is this something that uh, harms you when youre working with . Uh yeah, i was raised here in cohen in grad and i been coming to the coast and collecting amber since i was a child to get a quote. It was very exciting. I knew it was light and fragile, even back then you simply fall in love with this material and little by little he learned to work with that. Yes. Do accept. Its for jill. It a nice but i have a project with but little bit here. Touch it. Yeah you, i worked on the edge here, slipping off pieces. So just so i played around with its for jewelry and it turned out like this book at all or so there are advantages to you for choice because dealer how do you select a piece of ember to work with . Yeah, what they do not support. So i use 2 methods, i lay out the amber, i buy it at the mill, this is fine. We cut it into the slabs and sort them by size. Okay . There are 2 options, basically do something with what you have or come up with an idea by carefully selecting each piece. And you can go through everything there and then find none of it works for you. So even if you have a ton of amber, your idea might not fit. Its a very long process, but in any case, you have to find the right piece law. Settlement data to lay too. I know that some artists actually color the amber in some way. Do you color your amber specifically for a piece of work or do you like to use the natural color that exist . Yeah, which i only like to use natural amber, just natural colors without any chemicals or physical coloring. Because its great is it is you can choose a piece of amber to work on, but with time its color will change. Its very interesting and how you execute your work will impact the color overtime and how it might look later itll be, it depends on the artist. Its a skill every now i wanted to ask about that. Does amber actually change over time . Not just the color, but the, the texture of the emperor as well. Uh, for its shape that yes, its white amber for example. Here the oil evaporates little by little and this changes its structure a bit. But these are Little Things that only a craftsman will notice. The color of this kind of amber will change year by year. If you have a piece like this, you can take a picture of it every year. And every year youll see a different color. Its very interesting. So if we take amber of this usual golden color, it will start darkening 20 or 30 years later or so thats quite a long time. But it will only become more valuable with time is valuable, increase with that color. And its interesting that my favorite amber is black amber. I dont think its very well known color for amber. So it has an interesting peculiarity and that it does the opposite. Over time. It becomes slightly gold and every year its like a drop of gold is that as well . So its very interesting to observe this a little bit of that. Very cool. Now youve touched on this a little bit before, but i see that you have a sketch over here. When you are working with amber, do you sketch out your ideas and then follow that pattern or just the amber speak to you . To give you an idea of what youre working on, you know ive learned how to make the stone work for me. Its you plan the work and already know which stone to work with, which is less vehicle quick i knew kind of would. But may i ask what youre working on right now, i guess to just deal with what i, what im doing this not long ago, they discovered a horde of valuables from 1300 b, c, and cyprus and found pieces of amber. So people have been extracting december for all that time going into the sea and collecting it. And my project is called the amber capture. Unfortunately, people die collecting this amber even now young people who havent really mastered scuba diving also die. So this idea came to me to amber capture, to whether its a realistic person or some kind of human form worse call. And so im doing this kind of work now. And these are already finished forms of practically ready to be worked on whats good. So these are the shapes that im working. Its also interesting. Thank you very much. Appreciated the mostly, the creatures, the program shit. So banks call on a key for you to post and you have to bill for the accident. Pizza would also try your soul to boston, where youd have to go, you know, 15 to sleep, to get them. Yes. Dont read them. What does it mean its . Its close to enough color. They have these people mooning. The stucco soon us probably to need to more. Im sure. Do you want us to national it is a bruno . Yes, thats up with finality goes ok. Yeah. Bush, thats good. Im let me play it on. This is a gelato 42 point miles sort of us. Thats a lot of bodies blowing to basel but id be calling them just lama for a buick. Know pretty a be here to do own pretty at the dock. Like but it was playing phone. Sheila suddenly like shut about 2 hours that seemed pretty into it till evident continental the standard. One of the great histories and the treasures of the world. And one of the largest of the positive stuff is white here in the baltic sea. So we are in the Community Red reason trying to word all the we can about this smoking goal the im action retents the and welcome back to going underground real cost to go around the world from do by the way, this weekend mark 62 years since the closure and the border between east and west and sectors of berlin. The head of the following is threats of a nuclear war between washington and moscow. Today, while the global south prepares for the brick summons of africa fighting ukraine, sees the usa and then ill give a crisis with the china and russia and let alone most of the world is represented by population that the un,